


The Carpenter

by NKI_Stories, RenGoneMad



Category: Naruto
Genre: Anbu Yamato | Tenzou, Angst and Romance, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Collaboration — Writer and Artist, Discord: Umino Hours, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Infinite Tsukuyomi, Love Confessions, M/M, POV Alternating, POV Umino Iruka, Pining, Secret Admirer, Secret Identity, Slow Burn, Yamato | Tenzou is lonely and needs a hug, Yamato | Tenzou's POV
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 15:50:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26830174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NKI_Stories/pseuds/NKI_Stories, https://archiveofourown.org/users/RenGoneMad/pseuds/RenGoneMad
Summary: “It’s my birthday.”The chūnin’s eyes widened. He looked out over the graveyard. Tenzō could see the incredulous thought as it formed:“And you’re spending ithere?”It never came to fruition; the man’s features slackened and his lips pressed together tight. When he turned back around, Tenzō fantasized that he could see more understanding than pity in the man’s gaze.The question he actually asked was soft, and not incredulous at all. “Do you want to be alone?”Tenzō had never been asked that question before. His exhausted brain churned sluggishly, searching for an honest answer. He wasn’t very surprised when he found it. “Not really.”
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi & Yamato | Tenzou, Umino Iruka/Yamato | Tenzou
Comments: 20
Kudos: 92
Collections: The Umino Hours Discord Events





	The Carpenter

**Author's Note:**

> This is for the Umino Hours Discord's 1-year anniversary! 
> 
> Artist: NKI_Stories  
> Writer: RenGoneMad
> 
> And thank you so much to hkandi for the fantastic beta!

The first thirteen birthdays of Tenzō’s life came and went without acknowledgment. As far as Root was concerned, birthdays didn’t exist. Concrete identities were liabilities, perpetuating a sense of individual, personal worth—and that simply didn’t conform with Danzo’s shinobi creed.

Tenzō was different from many of the rest, however. 

He had never really been born at all. 

There was no reason to believe that most of what Root taught him held a single kernel of truth, but there was also no reason to doubt that particular piece of information. Tenzō _was_ an experiment, a genetic hybrid caused by the grafting of the Shodaime’s DNA into that of an ordinary infant. There was no denying that.

Although ultimately—whether Tenzō was born from a living woman or grown in a testing chamber—it was unimportant. The date of his birth wouldn’t have mattered either way; tools had no use for identities. 

When Tenzō finally broke free, when he was accepted into standard ANBU despite all of his past, Hiruzen allowed Tenzō to see the information that would be put into his official file. There were few lines, but anything more would have been a fabrication. 

His name was “Cat,” accompanied by a drawn depiction of the mask he was given. The name of the team he was to be placed on was also included, and then several lines of numbers: the date of his acceptance into ANBU; an ANBU identification number, one which was given no description and that Tenzō couldn’t decipher; and finally, another date: a birthdate. 

It told Tenzō that, in a few month’s time, on August the tenth, he would turn fourteen years old.

Randomly chosen, recovered from confiscated files, or a mostly accurate estimate determined by the ANBU medic’s physical assessment—it didn’t matter. 

For the first time in Tenzō’s life, he had a birthday. He had something to define him _._

He wondered what that day would feel like.

* * *

Thrust into a new life in ANBU, with a team that, with any luck, would last past his next mission—Tenzō ended up losing track of the days. That first year, he didn’t remember his birthday until early September, by which point it felt too late to appreciate. He resolved to do better next year. 

* * *

He succeeded, in that he actually remembered on the day of—but it didn’t feel right to celebrate while setting Bear’s broken leg with a sickening pop, with Lizard’s corpse sealed into a scroll on his hip. 

Maybe next year. 

* * *

When his sixteenth birthday came around, Tenzō was in the field again. This time, he wasn’t sure if he would make it back.

When Kakashi came for him, Tenzō realized that maybe there was someone else that would care about his birthdays, too.

* * *

Somehow, he survived to his seventeenth. He wasn’t knee-deep in dead and injured teammates. The forest was thick and humid, near enough to Konoha that it smelled like home. Summer held on with a desperate grip, beading sweat beneath Tenzō’s happuri though they had been resting for a few hours. 

Two people stood watch. Tenzō and Kakashi were supposed to be sleeping. 

Kakashi was: beneath the humming of cicadas, Tenzō could just barely hear the slow, deep breaths, and the way they subtly hitched with the fluctuation of nature’s sounds, ready to wake him if they proved irregular enough to be man-made. Tenzō knew, though, that Kakashi’s sleep was no more restful in the utter silence of the ANBU barracks. 

Some things just couldn’t be turned off. Instinct, borne from more years in the field than safe at home, was one of those things.

Normally, Tenzō would have fallen asleep first, slightly more capable of finding peaceful rest than his captain.

Not tonight.

Tenzō could tell someone, he thought. That was what birthdays were meant to be—celebrating with others. That was what he had imagined one year prior, and then the year before that, and the year before. 

Something stayed his tongue. 

Kakashi’s birthday had come and gone without a word of recognition. Tenzō wasn’t even sure when their other comrade’s birthdays were, but if they had passed, they had gone uncelebrated within the unit. Perhaps they had others with which to celebrate. 

Kakashi didn’t, yet he hadn’t said a word.

Tenzō tried to imagine telling Kakashi it was his birthday. He went over the conversation in his head, trying to figure out exactly how to explain why the date was so important to him, why he wanted it to be acknowledged in at least some minor, minuscule way. 

He couldn’t find the words.

Tenzō closed his eyes and hoped not to dream. 

* * *

Tenzō’s eighteenth birthday found the team in Konoha, waiting for Kakashi to recover from another bout of chakra depletion before they could be called once more. Kakashi never said as much, but he didn’t want people around when he was weak. He never relaxed his guard at those times, muscles tense and eye sharp. Somehow, vulnerability was more difficult for Kakashi to trust people with than his own life.

Might Guy might have been an exception, but Tenzō didn’t pretend to understand that relationship. Contrary to every other human in the world, Kakashi seemed to find Guy’s presence soothing. It wasn’t in his words, but in the slope of his shoulders, the smoothing out of the growing wrinkles around his eye—the soft snores Tenzō heard as he passed Kakashi’s hospital room. He had peered in to see his captain sleeping deeply, Guy sitting in the chair beside him.

Tenzō never saw Kakashi more relaxed than with Guy beside him. 

Tenzō didn’t have anyone he could sleep beside. 

He wanted to.

He wandered Konoha with no specific goal in mind other than to do _something_. Something memorable. 

Buying dango from a stall seemed like a good choice, since a full cake seemed a bit much for a single person to consume. 

The confection was cloyingly sweet, but the stick would have made a good replacement for a senbon in a pinch.

Summer had already started to give way to autumn, and some of the trees were starting their shift to shades of amber. Tenzō followed a trail of orange oaks out of town, towards the training grounds. The sun had mostly set by the time he arrived at the memorial stone.

He stood before it for long minutes, sticky fingers buried in his pockets, and stared at the names. 

There were no dates, no quotes, The few clan names grouped together were by coincidence, nothing more. The stone said little about the people written on it—only that they were shinobi who died for the sake of their village. 

Tenzō had known some of them, more than likely, but only by their codenames.

Tenzō wondered how many people remembered them by more.

It wasn’t a long walk from the memorial stone to the graveyard. It had been continually expanded over the years, new rows being added with each generation, each war, each battle. Clans were no longer as separated as they once had been; Nara overlapped with Akimichi, and Inuzuka with Yamanaka. There were civilians buried here, as well—anyone who could be called a denizen of Konoha. 

Here, there were dates. 

Birthdays, death days, wedding anniversaries. Here, Tenzō could look at a gravestone and the one beside it and see that Yūhi Kaede had died only a year after her husband, Yūhi Sano. There were no children buried beside them, but the graves had flowers fresher than those on the surrounding, and the stones had been washed since the last windfall. 

Kaede and Sano had been loved. 

Perhaps someone had loved Tenzō’s parents, as well, whoever they were.

* * *

By Tenzō’s twentieth birthday, he considered going to the graveyard a tradition. Though he had been a day late for his nineteenth, it was close enough to count, and he made up for it by arriving just after noon the next year, even though it meant his forty-fifth consecutive hour without sleep. 

If he slept, he wouldn’t wake before the days changed.

The sun was high and bright, heating the gravestones to the warmth their occupants had had in life. The polished surfaces reflected light into Tenzō’s eyes, so he closed them, leaning back against rough bark. It caught short hairs, tugging at his scalp, and digging uncomfortably into his bandaged shoulder, but it was a familiar pain.

The tree wasn’t one of Tenzō’s creations. It had been there long before the graves themselves.

Tenzō pried his eyes open periodically, watching the shadows lengthen over Hatake Sakumo’s grave. It was tidy, well-kept. Kakashi had cleaned it since the last rainstorm, and clean lines indicated he had cut away the encroaching grass with a kunai. It was probably easier to find time since Kakashi was dismissed from ANBU. 

Nature’s growth was waning to make room for fall. He probably wouldn’t have to cut away the grass again before springtime, when fresh seeds would attempt once more to eat at the unnatural barrier in their path. 

In the end, new life always overtook death. 

Tenzō liked the idea of being remembered, memorialized, but he didn’t know if he wanted a grave. He didn’t like the idea of his body rotting inside a box, fighting against time until roots would break through or something else ravaged the land.

Perhaps a tree instead of a grave, he thought with some irony. It could bear a metal plaque, inscribed with August tenth and some much more certain second date. There might not be a name at all—or perhaps Kakashi would make sure that “Tenzō” was carved on it somewhere. 

He would probably do it himself if no one else did. Kakashi believed in honoring the dead. 

Even if no one else recalled Tenzō, Kakashi would. That would have been comforting, except that Kakashi would probably spend the majority of the time absorbed in guilt and self-loathing over his death, whether Kakashi had actually been at fault or not.

He wouldn’t be—not anymore. 

They were still both shinobi of Konoha, still comrades… but they weren’t a team. They weren’t companions. They wouldn’t be together to watch each other’s backs. Tenzō could no longer follow from behind, trusting Kakashi to know where to lead. 

Now, Tenzō led his own team.

He knew he would feel the guilt for his subordinate’s deaths, regardless of the circumstances, regardless of if they had left his command or not. He could understand now what Kakashi meant when he said that his mistakes had cost people their lives. 

Kakashi leaving ANBU might have stolen him from Tenzō’s daily life, broken the security of the bond they had formed—but it wouldn’t do a damn thing to erase Kakashi’s guilt.

Tenzō didn’t know exactly how he wanted to be remembered, but it wasn’t as a perpetual source of misery for the man he respected most. 

He didn’t want to be like the father whose grave lay before him. 

Closing his eyes, Tenzō focused on the rustle of leaves in the gentle breeze, letting his body’s pains fade into the background for the first time in far too long.

A shadow fell over him. 

Tenzō breathed deeply and reached out his senses. 

One human with shinobi-levels of chakra, and standing a safe distance away; without the use of ninjutsu, Tenzō would have to rise to his feet to reach them. He couldn’t identify any hostile intent, and once his brain jolted awake enough to process where he had fallen asleep, he determined that the likelihood of an enemy poorly ambushing him in Konoha’s graveyard was exceptionally low.

Slowly, he loosened cramped muscles and prised open dry eyes. Pains shot through his body, reminding him of the reasons he should have headed home in the first place. The burn wound on his right elbow stung viciously as he flexed it.

“Are you alright?”

Silhouetted by the sinking sun, the shinobi’s facial features were mostly obscured. From what Tenzō could gleam, they were male, a young adult, and at least mildly intelligent (judging by the distance they kept and the unobtrusive quality of their tone, clearly aiming not to alarm). They were not ANBU, but someone who had spent time in the field. A chūnin or tokubetsu, perhaps—likely the former; in Tenzō’s experience, the higher the ranks would have decided from his breathing and chakra flow that he wasn’t in physical distress and left him be. 

This man either didn’t have that skill, or was asking about something beyond the physical. 

Well, Tenzō did have to admit that falling asleep in a graveyard, with a good portion of his body wrapped in bandages, would seem rather alarming to some people. 

The man stepped to the side, turning slightly so he was no longer concealed by backlight. Tenzō cataloged a chūnin vest, ink-stained hands, tanned skin, a brown ponytail, sorrel eyes, a horizontal scar, a concerned expression— 

_Concerned_. 

“Sorry to disturb you. I just, uh…” The chūnin reached up, scratching awkwardly where the scar crossed over the bridge of his nose. “You hadn’t moved since I got here, and you look like you just got out of the hospital and fainted in a cemetery, so… but you are, uh—ok, then?”

Tenzō opened his mouth. His dry throat worked around the words that swelled on the tip of his tongue, dripping free before he could stop them.

“It’s my birthday.” 

The chūnin’s pretty eyes widened. He looked out over the morbid stones, the monuments to death. Tenzō could see the incredulous thought as it formed: _“And you’re spending it_ here _?”_

It never came to fruition; the man’s features slackened and his lips pressed together tight. When he turned back around, Tenzō fantasized that he could see more understanding than pity in the man’s gaze.

The question he actually asked was soft, and not incredulous at all. “Do you want to be alone?”

Tenzō had never been asked that question before. His exhausted brain churned sluggishly, searching for an honest answer. He wasn’t very surprised when he found it. “Not really.” 

The chūnin nodded and took a step closer, then sank to the ground, crossing his legs. He didn’t look at Tenzō, gaze flitting among the gravestones and picking nervously at a loose thread near his knee. 

“Happy birthday.” 

Tenzō’s face warmed. He realized he was staring and turned his eyes to Sakumo’s grave. “Thanks.” 

While Tenzō had always been fairly comfortable with silence, the chūnin obviously wasn’t. Perhaps Tenzō seemed intimidating; the bandages covered his ANBU tattoo, but it was probably a fair guess that anyone who came to a graveyard on their birthday, exhausted and significantly bandaged, was a touch off in the way that often came with higher ranks. 

“How old are you?” the chūnin asked abruptly. 

“Twenty.” Tenzō cut himself off before he could follow with:“Or so they say.” He released the unused breath through his nose.

“Oh.” The chūnin perked up and glanced over, perhaps relieved to have something to start a discussion around. “I’m only a few months older than you, then. I don’t recognize you from the Academy, though.” 

“No, we weren’t in the same class.” 

There was a beat of silence, but when Tenzō didn’t volunteer any information, the chūnin continued. “I’m Umino Iruka.”

A pretty name—one that had been chosen with love and care and an appreciation for thematic symmetry. 

Tenzō’s name had been randomly chosen during a mission; it suddenly seemed inadequate. 

“Who are you visiting?” he asked in lieu of reciprocating. 

Iruka blinked, then pointed in a direction a few columns down. Tenzō squinted and scanned the nearby stones, finding two that bore the Umino family name. Small white flowers lay at the base, neatly contrasting against lush green and polished silver. “My parents. This is their wedding anniversary, so I come here every year to visit.” 

Tenzō must have been too late to see him the previous years. He wished he hadn’t been. 

“Why do you come for their wedding?” He knew from hearing other shinobi speak that birthdays or the anniversaries of people’s deaths were most traditional. It only occurred to him belatedly that most of those conversations he had _overheard_ , not been told directly. “Ah, if you don’t mind me asking. I’m sorry if that was intrusive.” 

“It’s fine. They were killed during the Kyuubi attack, so it’s a little crowded here then.” Iruka’s lips quirked in a wry, humorless smile. It dropped as he shrugged. “I come on their birthdays or holidays sometimes, but their wedding was more important to them. They always took the whole day together for their anniversary. My dad used to say that celebrations should be about reaffirming bonds with the people you love, and their marriage was the most important thing to them, so.”

Tenzō could see the logic in that, but he didn’t know where that left him. The only bond he wanted to reaffirm was with Kakashi, and that was no longer possible. Not in the way it had been.

He wanted that back, but he didn’t know how or why.

“Not that it’s a bad thing to take time for yourself!” Iruka waved a palm, backtracking as he seemed to realize how his statement could be taken. He chuckled awkwardly. “That’s not what I meant.”

Tenzō wasn’t really sure what Iruka had meant then, but that wasn’t what most concerned him at the moment.

Tenzō had never lost something he wanted before. 

Iruka had.

“What do you miss about them?” Tenzō asked. 

Iruka’s eyes widened, taken aback, but he didn’t tell Tenzō off for prying. His brows furrowed, causing a slight wrinkle in the center of his scar. “Almost everything, I guess. I miss my mom’s puns. My dad brushing our hair. His cooking. Mom constantly trying to explain chakra techniques to me, and me ignoring her.” Iruka half-smiled again, but this time his eyes matched the expression, growing warm and fond. 

Tenzō wondered what it would be like to be the person who caused that expression—without the sobering that followed.

“I wish I had listened to them both more,” he continued quietly. “Skipped dinner less. Heard more stories about my grandparents. It’s the little things I miss most.” 

The pain was still there. If they had died in the Kyuubi attack then Iruka hadn’t seen them in nearly ten years, and yet he still grieved.

 _Grief_. 

Tenzō knew that word. 

He knew the many stages of it, and knew how to recognize psychological instability in his teammates after a tragedy. He knew the symptoms of depression and at what point to consider emotional conflict a liability in the field. 

Many people had died around Tenzō. Most were on the other side of the battle; some weren’t. Most Tenzō hadn’t known; some, he had. 

None of them would Tenzō have said he knew _well_ : few had names or faces, birthdays or anniversaries. Tenzō recalled some of the jutsu they favored, or how they operated in the field, or what they were doing when they died. He didn’t remember _them_.

In reality, perhaps Tenzō had never experienced true grief. He had mourned for those lost, but not for his own sake. He had never had strong enough ties to sever, never known someone well enough to miss waking up and seeing them every day, to notice their absence from his life. 

He did now. Even though Kakashi wasn’t dead, everything had changed. The seal that had bound them together had been broken by a single order from the Hokage. 

His life would never be the same.

“Who are you here for?” Iruka’s words filtered through Tenzō’s mind, causing a resonance that sank down to his core. 

_Tenzō was grieving Kakashi._

“Myself,” he replied. 

He expected some sort of strong reaction, but it didn’t come. Iruka simply nodded and looked down at his own knees. 

A gentle breeze chased the last of the sun’s rays. Neither of the graveyard’s living occupants moved to leave. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Iruka’s soft voice broke the stillness. 

Tenzō did. 

He really, really did—but he had nothing to say.

“I’m afraid I’ve already cost you plenty of time, Iruka-san. You don’t have to keep me company.” 

“It’s not a problem.” Iruka rubbed his scar and gave an embarrassed chuckle. “Actually, it’s kind of nice to talk to an adult for a change.”

“Oh.” Tenzō didn’t see a ring on Iruka’s finger, but that didn’t mean a hell of a lot. Shinobi birthed young, married young, and died young. “You have children?”

Iruka’s eyes widened. “What? Uh, no, I’m not—” His cheeks looked darker, but that could have been the lighting. “I teach at the Academy. I mean, I talk to my coworkers and I have some friends but, they gave me my own class last year so I don’t have a lot of time outside of lesson plans and chasing the kids around and I work the mission desk, too—” 

Tenzō didn’t realize he was smiling until Iruka cut himself off, gaze flickering down to Tenzō’s lips. Tenzō cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have assumed.”

“No, out of context, that did sound strange.” Iruka’s hand dropped to rub at his arm. “And I’m guessing you can’t tell me what you do.” 

Definitely intelligent. Tenzō didn’t bother hiding his smile this time. He bent his knee, resting his arm on it to reduce the strain on his injured shoulder. “You might be right about that, sensei.”

“What about your hobbies? Are those classified, too?” Iruka asked, tone more amused than offended. 

Tenzō wondered when his own heart had started beating faster. 

“They might be, if I had any.” 

“None?” Iruka’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t have a single thing you like to do in your free time?”

‘What free time?’ nearly escaped Tenzō’s mouth, but he clamped down on it. He _did_ have free time, extremely limited though it was, and mostly given when Kakashi was too low on chakra for them to be sent out again. 

That wouldn’t be happening anymore. 

Iruka was waiting for an answer. 

“I have some books. Local animals, edible herbs. Architecture, anatomy,” Tenzō listed, mentally scanning through the bookshelves he had built into his cabin walls. 

“If they’re useful for your job, they don’t count as hobbies,” Iruka interrupted. He raised an eyebrow. “Are those for work or pleasure?”

Tenzō hummed, looking up at the sky. The moon would be rising before long. “I'm afraid that's sensitive information, sensei." He didn't continue with 'if I told you, I'd have to kill you', because threats tended to lose their humor when you knew someone could, and would, follow up on them. 

"So, work." Iruka shook his head minutely. "I hope you at least get paid more than I do."

"I hope I don't." Iruka's brow raised, and Tenzō felt the need to elaborate. "Ah, I just mean… I think the work of a teacher is very worthwhile, and undervalued. I know I wouldn't have the patience to deal with children every day." He paused, glancing sideways. "You aren't allowed to tie them to their seats, are you?"

"You know, I've never been told not to," Iruka replied, lips twitching up. "But I normally stop at booby trapping the windows."

"Hmm." Tenzō nodded. "I guess scaring them into submission is out of the question, too?"

"It depends on the method." Iruka's eyes glinted with humor. "I've found threats of extra homework and some yelling normally helps. What were you going to use?"

"I've been told I'm good at scary stories." Tenzō remembered one older girl in Root, one of the ones who helped care for the younger kids, that loved them. After she disappeared, he took to telling them sometimes. "I have a good face for it."

Iruka blinked at him, eyes trailing over his features. "How so?"

Tenzō raised his head, widening his eyes and slackening his jaw in the classic expression that had earned him at least a few looks of horror from children that had been making corpses since they were five. 

Iruka snorted, devolving into snickers. “That’s supposed to be scary?” 

Tenzō was torn between mild offense, and the desire to do it again just to see if Iruka would keep laughing. 

“Sorry, sorry,” Iruka grinned. “I guess not much frightens me after dealing with thirty ten-year-olds every day.” 

_Thirty_? Was that how many children were in an academy class? 

He hoped there were multiple classes a year. 

It was a time of peace, and yet Tenzō had counted eight new additions to the memorial stone since January—not to mention those retiring from active duty due to age or disability, or the nameless ones like Tenzō that might never be given a place on the stone at all.

Iruka must have tasted the change in Tenzō’s thoughts. 

“Do you have any birthday wishes?” he asked quietly. Crickets chirped and an owl hooted in the woods behind them. Small rodents scurried under leaves, more alive than any of the names that surrounded them. 

Tenzō’s stare was drawn to Hatake Sakumo. Yūhi Sano and Kaede. Umino Ikkaku and Kohari. 

“Can you… tell me more about your parents?”

The individual colors in Iruka’s irises were becoming difficult to distinguish, both from low light and from Tenzō struggling to keep his eyes focused despite the exhaustion weighing him down.

Iruka nodded and began to speak.

It was two hours later before Tenzō found his way to an empty cabin, with books he hardly read and the ghosts of memories that had never been his.

* * *

As in many things in Tenzō’s life, Kakashi had been the instigator. 

Before him, Tenzō had used mokuton as he was told: a weapon. Sure, there were aspects that Tenzō experimented with when he had the time—it certainly hadn’t taken very long in the Land of Iron during winter for him to figure out that small shelters weren’t hard to make—but creativity was restricted to things that helped him complete the mission. Each use was carefully weighed against the amount of chakra it would consume, and his inability to control it at the mass scale of the Shodaime was a constant knowledge pressing into the back of his skull with every failed attempt.

Kakashi had changed that. (Albeit in the most irritating ways possible—as he did most things.)

The first request had been a two-story house rather than a tiny cabin, because Kakashi had said he liked the view from roofs; nevermind that they’d been in a canyon with literally nothing to see for miles. 

The second time, it had been a very fine-toothed comb because Shiba had _somehow_ gotten his mohawk matted with blood, and water just hadn’t been sufficient to return it to its usual perky state. 

The third time, it had been a chair with a footrest, because Kakashi had twisted his ankle and had said the elevation would help the swelling. (Tenzō couldn’t really argue with that one, but given that he knew Kakashi could suture himself and take a stab to the thigh with nary a flinch, he figured Kakashi acted more for the joy of inconveniencing Tenzō than any actual concern for himself—a routine disregard that was even more irritating than the request itself.)

The next time Kakashi wanted a chair, he requested it with slightly higher armrests, and a shelf to put _Icha Icha Paradise_ on. (Tenzō had drawn the line at the last one, but if the armrests were a little higher the next time he crafted a chair—well, Kakashi’s mask had allowed Tenzō to ignore the smug humor that had no doubt been telegraphed there.)

Up to the age of twenty, Tenzō had still never used mokuton for ‘fun’ as such, but he had picked up a few books on architecture, excusing it to himself as potentially useful for complex structures, such as creating large bridges over chasms. 

(If one of the books was of a more decorative nature, with pictures of cathedrals and castles around the world, that was only because the bookstore owner had been a particularly kind old woman, with a hunch to her back and cataracts so bad she’d thought he was a woman before he spoke. Tenzō refused to admit that he was easily guilted, but he _did_ believe in supporting small businesses.)

After meeting Iruka, Tenzō picked up another book. 

This one wasn’t so different from the others, not at first glance. It dealt with wood and their various densities, standard support placements and geometric shapes that provided the most stability.

It had one more facet, one that marked it as different in Tenzō’s mind as his twentieth birthday had been from his nineteenth: 

This one covered sealing—and not the sort used for fūinjutsu. 

Instead of learning how to create temporary structures that Tenzō would discard or absorb back into himself, he learned how to make things _last_. 

He learned how to rub oils into the pores, creating protection from the elements. He learned how to cut wood without weakening it, and how to work against the grain to reduce the chance of splintering. He learned what to do when the sealant began to weaken, and how to refinish a piece that was nearing the end of its natural life. He learned the scents of tung oil and turpentine, and he learned that he loved them. 

Tenzō learned how to create things that came from his own mind, not someone else’s.

Tenzō learned that it was alright to have his own desires, and to act on them. 

Tenzō learned that, if he wanted to protect something dear to him, he would have to act on it himself, because things didn’t last unless they were made to.

The first thing Tenzō made that turned out exactly how he wanted (because, as it turned out, curved wood and asymmetrical shapes and creativity were all infinitely more difficult than a simple cube), he gifted to Kakashi. 

The stain had been difficult to do correctly, both because he didn’t have a fantastic eye for color, and because applying it evenly took a more artistic hand than Tenzō’s. It took hours, but he managed, and the sense of satisfaction he achieved from it was impossible to liken to anything else. 

It wasn’t Tenzō attempting to live up to the legacy of the Shodaime, or what his team needed in a leader—this was merely _Tenzō_. 

Finishing the piece took more layers of sealant than he thought possible, something he read was necessary to prevent the vibrant color of the stain from fading in the future, but the end result was about as good as Tenzō could have hoped.

Luck was on his side, and Tenzō was able to push his team back to Konoha by the afternoon of September fifteenth.

He had never seen Kakashi truly shocked before that day. 

He hoped he would see it again, along with the flustered pink that crept over the edges of his senpai’s mask, bringing color to pale cheeks. 

Kakashi stared down at the sculpture in his hands for several long breaths, tracing it with his eye before doing the same with his fingertips. He felt each spine and ridge of the replica _aloe cameronii_ , taking in the brilliant crimson hue of the wood, the delicate curve of each leaf. 

He had only said it once, but there was no possible world in which Tenzō could have forgotten; it was one of a very few times in which Kakashi had responded directly to a personal question. 

“Distinctive and long red leaves, prickly edges, underestimated, stubborn enough to thrive in an awful environment.” Kakashi’s mask had twitched and his eye crinkled—a touch too reflective, too internal, to be focused upon the living. “It reminds me of someone.”

Kakashi now held the carved plant as if it were something fragile and precious. After several long moments, he turned without a word, retreating into the tiny room. Tenzō recognized it for the invitation it was and stepped inside, shutting the door behind him. 

Delicately, Kakashi placed the gift in the center of his neatly-made bed, then knelt. Gloved hands flipped through several seals, fast enough that Tenzō would have had to make a sincere effort to recognize them. 

He didn’t.

Tenzō felt a faint release of chakra, a barrier seal being broken, and then Kakashi pulled open a drawer concealed in the bottom of the bed frame. 

Inside were only a few items. The ones Tenzō could see were a kunai with faded symbols written on the wrapped handle, a small leather medkit, and a sheathed tanto. 

Kakashi lifted the kunai with reverent fingers.

So slowly it was nearly painful, he placed it neatly beside the carved aloe. 

Several seconds ticked by in silence. Tenzō’s heart beat with them. 

Finally, Kakashi broke the silence with a soft murmur.

“They look good together.”

Kakashi didn’t explain, and Tenzō didn’t ask.

He didn’t understand, but there was no questioning the approval in Kakashi’s voice. 

* * *

After that, Tenzō came back to visit occasionally. Kakashi showed up at Tenzō’s cabin, as well, at odd hours and through windows and deliberately setting off Tenzō’s wards. He stole Tenzō’s fresh fruits more often than not. 

Their lives weren’t the same as when they were teammates, never would be—but Kakashi still took advantage of Tenzō’s hospitality, and Tenzō was still the ninken pack’s second-favorite-person (Guy apparently smelt like tortoises, bringing him significantly lower on their list, to Tenzō’s amusement.)

A single day was all it had taken to alter Tenzō’s life.

Just a single jar of crimson wood stain, a few bottles of sealant, and some ruined paintbrushes.

That day did something else, as well:

It forever sealed Umino Iruka into Tenzō’s heart. 

* * *

Tenzō had never once, in over fifteen years as a shinobi, used the mission desk. In fact, he wasn’t even certain what a formal mission report _looked_ like. Root had a no-papertrail policy except for in very specific cases, something that was only possible with a tyrant leader dipping his bandaged hands into every mission ran. 

Tenzō had written reports on rare occasions in ANBU, when directly requested by Kakashi or, now as a team captain, the Hokage himself—but they didn’t follow the same standard as A-rank missions and below. 

It was unlikely that most shinobi ever learned the code used after an unexpected, entirely intentional, civilian casualty. 

The people who filed chūnin’s reports would have had no idea what to do with a scroll that explained how one of the team members had initiated the jutsu that took his own life, solely to prevent Konoha’s secrets from falling into enemy hands. 

Tenzō hoped that Iruka didn’t know any of that, at the least. 

* * *

Once Tenzō started to pay attention, he saw evidence of Umino Iruka around all of Konoha, in hoarse shouts or friendly greetings to coworkers or the parents of students. Occasionally, when heading to or from the Sandaime’s office, Tenzō cloaked himself near the mission desk and caught a glimpse of a brown ponytail and a good-natured smile. 

Iruka smiled easily. 

Tenzō wished he could cause it again himself, without bodies of the dead between them.

He liked to entertain that thought—only sometimes—when he was trying to fill the mental space that had once been occupied by dealing with his captain’s antics, or when he was creating something for no other reason than to see it be created. 

Tenzō wasn’t ashamed of his fantasies, though he tried not to dwell on them, either.

Even after months passed and spring gave new life to the world, Umino Iruka never fully left his thoughts.

Tenzō wasn’t a creative person. There hadn’t been a single time in his life that he envisioned something and felt an intense desire to bring it to life. 

However, he was a _tactile_ person, and when Tenzō’s hands were occupied, he found it easier to break down the layers of paranoia and vigilance that Root had carved into him long before ANBU had the opportunity. 

When Tenzō was focusing on a shape he wanted to create, he wasn’t thinking about manifesting the huge miracles of power for which the Shodaime was known, or trying to conserve his chakra so he wouldn’t accidentally begin to sap it from the earth (because, try as he might, Tenzō had never quite gotten the hang of the mokuton’s inherent capability for sage jutsu, even if his chakra sometimes attempted to convince him otherwise). 

There was something satisfying about seeing Tenzō’s hard work manifested, days and weeks and months after completion. He saw the progress he made with each iteration, the gentle slopes and curves he was learning to produce. He admired the varied grain of the wood that as far as he knew had no scientific name. 

Lovingly, carefully, he preserved each piece, even the ones that he knew could have been done better. 

Each cup, each bowl, each statue, was sanded and sealed—literal pieces of Tenzō that would exist long after his death. 

It was a start. 

It was a sign that Tenzō had _lived_ , that he was an actual person with ideas and emotions and value outside of what some higher power ordered him to do. It was more indicative of him than a series of numbers chosen at random. 

Perhaps it would give Kakashi some reason to remember him fondly, too, even if Tenzō wasn’t sure there was a power on the earth strong enough to alleviate his senpai’s predilection for guilt.

In all likelihood, Umino Iruka would last after Tenzō’s death, as well. 

That was good. Iruka had the ability to _do_ good. 

Tenzō saw it in the eyes of students when he stopped by the Academy on his way to Hokage Tower. He saw it in the gentle way Iruka corrected fresh-faced chūnin turning in their first reports. He saw it in the look on Iruka’s face while watching the jinchūriki scarf down a meal for which the teacher had paid, without any reason that Tenzō could see other than affection and love. 

He saw this capability for good demonstrated in the effect that Iruka had on Tenzō himself, whether Iruka would ever know it or not.

He didn’t stalk the chūnin (Tenzō wasn’t _Kakashi_ , after all)—but he paid attention when he could. 

Iruka never noticed him. Not even once. 

Tenzō didn’t blame him for that, particularly as he was nearly always fully covered by ANBU apparel, cat mask included. He wouldn’t have blamed Iruka anyway, though; he had been told before that, apart from his Ghoul Face, he was quite average looking. That was an excellent thing for a shinobi, and far more practical than silver hair and a crimson eye. 

But this time, for one of the first times in his life, Tenzō wanted something. 

He wanted Iruka to remember him. 

It didn’t have to be big, or important. 

He wanted Iruka to see something, something of Tenzō, and _smile_.

He wanted to hold a tiny candle to Iruka’s bonfire-large capacity for good, and burn that flame himself.

Tenzō wanted to be something more.

* * *

Realistically, Tenzō didn’t actually know Umino Iruka very well, and exceptionally little about his current personal life. It was equally likely that Iruka was fond of knitting fuzzy pink sweaters as it was botany. Tenzō wanted to make something useful and aesthetically pleasing, but that was difficult without much frame of reference.

He also wanted it to be meaningful. 

Staring at a headstone with the names “Umino Ikkaku” and “Umino Kohari” engraved in the smooth surface, Tenzō found his answer.

* * *

Tenzō liked to consider himself a realistic person. No one who had seen the things he had could be a true optimist, but he didn’t believe the universe tended to work against people. Humans were the determiners of their own fates, and resigning oneself to misery was certain to achieve just that.

However, while that single meeting had meant more to Tenzō than he could accurately put into words, he held no delusions that it held a similar place in Iruka’s heart. 

That was fine. Tenzō wasn’t looking to take anything more from Iruka than he already had; he was looking to give, instead. 

In order to do that, and to avoid any sense of obligation that Iruka might feel, Tenzō couldn’t approach Iruka directly. 

It wasn’t his face or artificial name that Tenzō cared about being remembered. 

* * *

Tenzō spent much of his twenty-first birthday cloaked, on a perch chosen for maximum visibility of Iruka’s apartment. Once he caught sight of the chūnin’s brown ponytail in the distance, he darted out, set the small gift on Iruka’s doorstep, and re-cloaked himself on the opposite rooftop—watching, waiting. 

Iruka approached, takeout bag in one hand, pulling his keys from his pocket with the other. His footsteps slowed as he looked up. 

Heartbeats pounded in Tenzō’s ears, slow but strong. 

Iruka glanced around, like he expected someone to jump out and announce themselves, or perhaps take the item back. After a few seconds, he knelt down, examining it without touching. 

Wise. 

Tenzō couldn’t see the exact seals that Iruka formed, though he would hazard a guess at a genjutsu release at the least. 

After a few moments, Iruka gently reached out, cradling the dolphin in his palm. 

Perhaps it was too obvious, gifting a dolphin to a man named Iruka, but Tenzō saw meaning in the name. He saw a family connection, a heritage. He saw loving parents who migrated from another land and endeavored to give a piece of that history to their child. 

Tenzō saw all of the things that he had never had, and that Iruka had lost. 

The dolphin had gentle slopes and a powerful tail, rounded eyes which shone. It curved in a graceful arc, down to where a strong fin connected with the sturdy base—the part that had taken Tenzō the most time to carefully shape, because it wasn’t entirely of his own creation. 

A pale seashell served as an integral part of the dolphin’s base. The dolphin’s tail grew from it (quite literally; carving a tiny hole in the center of the shell, and then molding wood through it without causing stress fractures from the pressure, had been a difficult feat). Dark grain contrasted against the pearlescent sheen. The wood then continued, filling in the center of the seashell itself, and widening at the base to provide support for both creature and seashell. 

At the head of the mammal, forming from the blowhole, the wood curved like a fountain of water. The elegant slopes would have taken a master carpenter to create, had it been done with hammer and chisel. 

Tenzō hadn’t done that, but he had worked tediously nonetheless—taking multiple grits of sandpaper to the surface, grinding down to reveal the grained interior of the wood, using oil and sealant to bring it to a shining luster.

This dolphin, Iruka’s gift, was the most beautiful part of Tenzō that had ever been. 

Iruka ran the pad of his thumb over the dolphin’s beak, stroking gently as if it were a living being. 

Tenzō could only see part of Iruka’s face from his vantage point, but—

Iruka’s lips lifted into a soft smile. 

Tenzō’s heart didn’t stop pounding until long after Iruka brought the dolphin inside and shut the door. 

**Author's Note:**

> There's even more artwork for this on NKI_Stories' [ tumblr](https://nki-stories.tumblr.com/post/631159467528028161/the-carpenter-created-by-rengonemad-and) !


End file.
